The Board Games Thread

For the non-KS enthusiasts, I wouldn't recommend using KS as a discount program. For games that will make it into distribution, you can likely buy it cheaper than the KS price. KS is if you like the goodies, or like helping to bring a project to life that wouldn't exist otherwise. KS isn't a pre-order system. (So don't get bent out of shape if your project ships late ) I think I'm at 60+ backed projects now.

Got to play Manhattan Project, and some more Sentinels last weekend. Still waiting for Shattered Timelines to arrive for Sentinels. Manhattan Project was an interesting take on the worker placement genre. With the ability to shut down other people's places to place stuff, I think it's good for groups that have people that like to optimize their worker placement too much, as you can bomb them into the stone age, or they have to invest in something other than just getting their engine going to prevent it....

The GoodDedicated Server: It's a Akitaro Watanabe that costs 2 more, works on all servers, and is an asset instead of an upgrade. This makes it a bit more vulnerable and costly to leverage, but also means you can use it for multiple forts and potentially get a better return. I've swapped this in for Akitaro in an ICE-heavy Jinteki deck, which also conveniently features a bunch of encryption nodes which will make it harder to trash if the Runner isn't keeping up with node trashing. (the Jinteki that forces a central server run before remote server attacks, in fact, which makes trashing the nodes that much more inconvenient)

Oversight AI: Cost 1(+click) to rez anything? Heck yeah. Hello early Janus and Archer! Stock this with a bunch of copies of really nasty ICE. Super strong ICE early, and when the discount versions fall or when you get some way to cheat the extra copies into play, just put out another copy. Possible MVP for me.

Weyland Consortium, Because We Built It: Sure, I've got a Weyland deck that has a ton of advance-able ICE. This seems pretty competitive with the +transaction identity, and possibly will yield more over the long haul.

Sure, that's another cardAll Nighter: Save up a tick for a rainy day? Sounds reasonable, but I have a hard time justifying using up those card slots on it when I could be doing something else. Maybe I'll build a Notoriety-using deck when the next Shaper identity comes out and use it then.

Bullfrog: It's a stronger Snowflake, but it costs more and you need to have a good place to punt the Runner to. Also, it moves around, which is half-good and half-bad. Not super impressed, but it does (mostly) block a Yog.0 until the user gets strength manipulation into play. I'll swap it in for the Chimeras in my Jinteki trap deck, which which will rarely lack for places to shove the runner that he doesn't want to go, and see how it does.e- Hmm. OTOH, you pretty much have to move the runner somewhere worthwhile or else you've just taken your ICE out of circulation. At cost 3 + draw + install, that's kind of pricy for a weak, one-shot effect. So, maybe not so good. Still, it seems like you can probably get good mileage out of them juggling the runner around your Central servers- use the archives as a dump point early game when there's nothing there to steal, dump them to something heavily defended that they can't get into or that will be cripplingly expensive to break mid-game, then in the late game you can use R&D as a dumping point.

Crescentus: I have a hard time wanting to use this in a Criminal deck when the cheaper, non-memory-consuming Emergency Shutdown is available. In a Shaper deck, though, this uses half the influence and can be fetched with a Test Run if you have something really expensive like Janus or Archer in play and want it to go away.

Deus X: Well, it's better than Net Shield. A bit less overspecialized, too, since AP ICE includes some scary things like Janus as well as all of that Jinteki net damage ICE. On the other hand, it's expensive and trash-to-use so if you do find yourself up against a bunch of net damage or AP ICE it won't provide you with persistent protection. I splashed one into one of my Shaper decks as a test-run fetchable singleton.

Doppleganger: A Desperado that pays out a run instead of a credit. A click is worth somewhat more than a credit, but it's way too conditional to be worth the swap, IMHO. It does cost one less influence, though, so I could see cross-faction-ing it into a fixed-strength breaker run efficiency deck. Kind of hard to want that over Dinosaurus in that role, though, unless I can get some extra synergy with per-run viruses and maybe Notoriety.

False Lead: Well, everyone has a 1-point, cost-3 agenda now. The power is a weak panic button, not super appealing, but the extra agenda cost flexibility will be appreciated for Haas and Jinteki.

Force of Nature: Not going to be replacing Yog.0 and Gordian Blade as the code gate breakers of choice any time soon, but it's a decent breaker with a 1 influence cost so it'll get a home in influence-starved decks.

Green Level Clearance: So, a Beanstock Royalties that costs 1 and gives you a draw. Not much stronger and forced draws can be awkward for the corp, but I guess it's good to have more play-for-cash options for Haas that doesn't cost influence. Also, another transaction for the +1 credits from transactions Weyland if you have the influence to spare. Not amazing, but solid.

Net Police: No links for you! Cute, but conditional, awfully cheap to trash, and not really strong enough to devote a superfort to keep alive. Could see it in a trace-heavy NBN deck.

Scrubber: Well, you have to trash three stuff to break even, except you're also probably costing the corp credits by trashing thier toys. I'd totally call this a "good" card, except Whizzard doesn't need it and Noise would rather use Imp, so it's primarily useful cross-faction at the moment. This will probably be much cooler when new Anarchist identities come out.

Tyrant: Kind of pricy, but reasonably strong and breaking through Sentry subroutines always costs the runner. I'd probably prefer an Ice Wall due to the cost, but it's nice to have the option of putting an advanceable, fairly strong, Sentry run-ender in the way.

Underworld Contact: Going to take an awfully long time to pay itself off. Could see using it with identities that start with link strength- which is to say, Kate, at the moment.

The BadDisruptor: More trash-to-use, and it consumes memory. Ick. It doesn't even cancel the trace, either, just knocks the base strength down to 0, so you're looking at spending 3-ish resources (draw, play & pay) to maybe knock three credits of strength off the corp's trace, which isn't a great trade. Anarchists tend to be kind of trace/tag protection light, so I could see using this with them as an early game buffer, but OTOH their love of viruses can also put memory at a premium and they're also often seen with Wyrm to combo with Parasite, which gives you an expensive early game panic button. Not worthless, but not going in to any of my decks at the moment.

Hourglass: That's an awfully high price tag for ICE that can't directly do any damage to a runner or stop a run. Strength 4 is cool, so maybe I could see it in a deck with a lot of Bioroids and Experiential Data, but for the moment color me not especially in a hurry to find room for it in a deck.

Inside Man: I've got to install 3 pieces of hardware to see a return on it, and there's just not that much hardware that's key to me at the moment. Pass.

Uroboros: Awfully pricy, only strength 4, and the first subroutine will only occasionally be an inconvenience. Maybe not actually bad, but I can't see taking this over a Tollbooth.

Bump for International Tabletop day on Saturday. Who's going, and what are you hoping to play?

I feel like I've been mooching off the other gamers at the weekly game night because I don't own any games yet (not counting monopoly, scrabble, sorry, etc.) so I want to buy a game to bring with me but haven't decided what to get yet. The store I have a gift card for is sold out of Ticket to Ride and pandemic, and don't really have anything else interesting to me, so I guess I'll hit the FLGS and see what I can find.

I did buy a small card and dice based D&D game called Inn-fighting, on a recent trip for work. I'm not sure if it's any good, but it was only $14 and small enough to fit in my suitcase easily.

I feel like I've been mooching off the other gamers at the weekly game night because I don't own any games yet (not counting monopoly, scrabble, sorry, etc.) so I want to buy a game to bring with me but haven't decided what to get yet. The store I have a gift card for is sold out of Ticket to Ride and pandemic, and don't really have anything else interesting to me, so I guess I'll hit the FLGS and see what I can find.

If you're in the market for co-op games like Pandemic, how about Ghost Stories? One of my favorite co-op games out there.

Or, alternately, how about Galaxy Trucker? Mechanically it's not much like TTR, but it's a fun, casual game. The real-time ship construction is a bit of a barrier to entry for first time players, but also a ton of fun. e- Or, possibly even better, how about Seven Wonders? Great casual game to play with a bunch of people. I've had good success with playing it with a large number of people who are mostly first-time players.

If you're looking for something at the super-light/social end of things, I really liked Dixit the one chance I had to play. It's in the apples-to-apples/balderdash genre - you have a hand of fantastical paintings; the person who is 'it' picks one card and gives a clue phrase. The other players then each pick a card from their hand that they think matches the clue phrase; then everyone has to try and pick the phrase-giver's picture from the available choices. The phrase-giver gets points only if some but not all of the other players identify his card; guessers get points for finding the correct card, and for each other person who picks their card.

If you haven't played the Marklin version of Ticket to Ride, I highly recommend it. They added new gameplay aspects of passengers and goods, which is interesting, and each train car card is unique.

Märklin is a great game. However, the unique train cards I find cause more confusion than they are worth. I play with a couple color-blind players, and the lack of consistent shapes makes them have to rely on the symbols more, and just slows them down a bit for a visual flourish I barely notice.

My favorite boards for Ticket to Ride at this point are Team Asia and Heart of Africa. I haven't gotten to try India yet, and that looks interesting as well.

JohnBob, do your color-blind players play Arkham Horror? I was considering this situation while I was playing. I'm not color-blind but I still have a tough time telling the blue they use from the green they use for otherworld encounters, unless I am looking at them right next to each other.

The only solution I could come with for color-blind folks was to go through and mark the deck with symbols.

Suggestions on cooperative board games? We've tried a few but haven't found anything that really hits the sweet spot between challenge and fun.Here's what we've tried:

Forbidden Island - The potential for getting screwed through no fault of the players put us off this oneCastle Ravenloft - The adventures are either too easy or too hard with difficulty scaling rapidly with additional players. Yes we could make our own, but why not just play D&D at that point?Wrath of Ashardalon - See aboveLegend of Drizzt - See above

I like the idea of Forbidden Island since players can help each other out or go their own way, turns can be talked about, and it promotes active problem solving, but if you get a bad roll on the flood tides, game over. The D&D games remove the worst of the random bits, but the special rules for some adventures are just plain masochistic with the encounters/traps, since you can only get 1 treasure per enemy slain it also slows down advancement. Again, we could house rule stuff out, but I don't want to rewrite a game I paid for, I just want to pull it out and have a good time with friends.

I figure something with a 60/40 player victory rate when everyone knows what they're doing seems about the fun sweet spot, since winning when there's no losing is boring too.

Well, I would say the cooperative game which is our bread and butter is Arkham Horror. It's a little bit involved, but it's fantastic and has great replayability. It also has flexible difficulty (depending on what Great Old One you're up against; Ithaqua or Yig are pretty easy, Cthulhu is hard mode, and Azeroth is easy-ish but you don't get the chance for an ultimate showdown with him).

When we started I would say it was 60/40 win-loss. Now that we're more experienced, it's closer to 90/10 with just the core game, but the expansions tend to increase the difficulty. I think with one of the "extended board" expansions we might be down below 50/50...

A more streamlined cooperative game, but very similar, is Ghost Stories (as Delor was talking about just a few posts ago). It takes 1-4 players and is pretty difficult (but relatively easy to learn) in the beginning.

Played Trajan for the first time last night. It's an interesting game, but I think it reaches my upper limit of complexity. I couldn't stay through the entire game, so I'm not sure how it ends.

I'm trying to decide if the "Mancala" method of choosing your action is awesome or horrible. I like how it takes a bunch of randomness out of the game, but I found myself working really hard to worry about how my current turn will effect future turns.

I'll see if I can get a loaner copy of Arham Horror at my FLGS since that sounds right up our alley. The Cthulu mythos might be off putting to one or two participants unless its tongue-in-cheek though.

Your game store loans games? They might be reticent to loan Arkham Horror, as there are one gazzillion pieces. Take extra care with placing the stands on the character markers. They are tight and have a tendency to rip the cardstock.

What is the nature of the Cthulhu reservation? It isn't tongue in cheek (well some of the encounters are kind of funny, but that isn't the focus,) but it isn't graphic either.

The Cthulu bits are (as one would expect) just like HP Lovecraft's work, and can totally be played for laughs if you like (just read encounter cards in a faux scary/spooky voice and you'll be laughing in no time).

If you can handle one person being the 'baddy' then Descent (v2, never played v1) is awesome.

Another + for Arkham Horror. The only times I've played it is with my D&D group, so it eveolves into a light role-playing experience, usually focusing on comedy. Last game I played I was an antiquities professor for Miskatonic U, while another person was playing a scientist. I had a lot of fun mocking her

"Oh, miss I can recreate my experimental results in this plane of existence. La dee dah""Do you know what it takes to get Tenure at Miskatonic? It's not pretty"

The loaned copies are played in store. It's a great demo program and seems to give them plenty of business. They also have various memberships that let you loan out games (you get charged for it if you lose/break something) for a week at home. I'm going to check either way since Arkham Horror isn't exactly cheap.

If the game can be played for laughs we'll be fine. I can't speak for the folks I think may not appreciate it, just basing my thoughts on experiences we've had at movies and other fare.

You see a sudden green flash of light somewhere ahead of you on the path. Racing to get there, you find a smoldering, scorched book. If you wish, you may try to gain what knowledge you can before it is reduced to ashes. If you do, lose 1 stamina as it burns your hands and then, if you are still conscious, gain 1 spell.

There's Red November, which is about a bunch of gnomes on a sub, and everything goes wrong. Often copies can be found cheaply.

For something with a lot of tension, you could try Space Alert. Not a good gateway game though, as it has a bit of complexity. Well, that and it's a Vlaada Chvátil game, which means player good ol' player torture.

For something with a lot of tension, you could try Space Alert. Not a good gateway game though, as it has a bit of complexity. Well, that and it's a Vlaada Chvátil game, which means player good ol' player torture.

Freakin' Space Alert. Everybody needs to play this. True, it's not a great gateway game... but holy carp is it insane.

EDIT: Actually, I'd love to see Space Alert featured on the Tabletop show. Just for the yelling and recriminations.

For something with a lot of tension, you could try Space Alert. Not a good gateway game though, as it has a bit of complexity. Well, that and it's a Vlaada Chvátil game, which means player good ol' player torture.

Freakin' Space Alert. Everybody needs to play this. True, it's not a great gateway game... but holy carp is it insane.

EDIT: Actually, I'd love to see Space Alert featured on the Tabletop show. Just for the yelling and recriminations.

Even better than Space Alert: Space Cadets. Everyone is given their own mini-game type thing corresponding to their station (sensors has to pull specific shapes out of a bag by feel alone, weapons flicks torpedoes down a track) and most of them have a time limit. Very much not a gateway game though, as each station has its own set of rules, and none of them are trivial.

If you haven't played the Marklin version of Ticket to Ride, I highly recommend it. They added new gameplay aspects of passengers and goods, which is interesting, and each train car card is unique.

Märklin is a great game. However, the unique train cards I find cause more confusion than they are worth. I play with a couple color-blind players, and the lack of consistent shapes makes them have to rely on the symbols more, and just slows them down a bit for a visual flourish I barely notice.

My favorite boards for Ticket to Ride at this point are Team Asia and Heart of Africa. I haven't gotten to try India yet, and that looks interesting as well.

True, they are difficult to discern even for non-colorblind players.

My favorite is Switzerland. India was ok, I would have to play it a few times to actually get the whole mandala strategy.

Bladelaw wrote:

Suggestions on cooperative board games? We've tried a few but haven't found anything that really hits the sweet spot between challenge and fun.

Pandemic is fun.

Miwa wrote:

There's Red November, which is about a bunch of gnomes on a sub, and everything goes wrong. Often copies can be found cheaply.

Heh, one of our friends died 5 minutes into the game the first time we played it. We don't really play it anymore.

My group played our first game of Eclipse last week, and have scheduled game 2 for this weekend. I have Rise of the Ancients coming in the mail this week as well.

Any recommendations for easing into deeper games? I was planning:

- Everyone choose races this time (played all human last game) - Add the ancient starting locations from the expansion (we have 4 players, so would be filling in two empty start areas). \

Anything else in the expansion so good that we need to add it right away? I read that the new tech mitigates what some people feel are overpowered plasma missles, but they weren't an issue last game for us.

I found it useful to set up the board in advance, hexes face down. If the person exploring draws and decides to discard instead of keeping the result, then you can do some shuffling to deal with that (IME, infrequent) case.

Suburbia - Love this game. Scales really well from 2-4 players. Each player builds a suburb of the same city, minimal direct antagonism, most comes from removing real estate tiles from the market to prevent them being utilized by other players. Simple enough to be a gateway game (IME, taught it to a couple people who've never played Euros) but deep enough and different enough with the randomized tiles between each game to be interesting, and maintain long term replay.

Tammany Hall - Friend picked it up from KS, really wanted to play it when I read about it, REALLY enjoyed it, and I usually hate area domination/control games.

Ladies and Gentlemen - Team game, 4-10 players. Each pair consists of a Victorian husband making money in the stock exchange, and a wife picking out clothes for a ball. Winner is the team with the most elegantly dressed lady at the ball. Odd player out is a Courtesan, and Gossip cards add to the cattiness. Funny with 2 on 2 people, can't wait to play with 6 or more.

I found it useful to set up the board in advance, hexes face down. If the person exploring draws and decides to discard instead of keeping the result, then you can do some shuffling to deal with that (IME, infrequent) case.

It speeds things up and makes the shape of the galaxy more apparent.

You can't really do that with the Ring III hexes, as those can expand outward in any direction until the pile runs out.

You can do it with the Ring I and II hexes, though, and in a 7-9 player game you also end up up with many of the III hexes predetermined, too, since you get an extra ring on the map with that many players.

Ended up at Madness in Plano, TX for National Board Game Day with a couple of friends. Was fairly empty when we got there but by the time we got up from a demo of Kingdom Builder the place was packed. Wound up playing Kingdom Builder, Castle Panic, Catacombs... I think that was all we had time for, I may be missing something.

I kept hearing good things about Catacombs and folks kept steering us to it. I... dunno. It was ok but not something I would ever spend money on. The 'sticker on a token' look of the bits was a big turn off as far as component quality, as well as the completely uninspired and bland floorplan art. Overall the production values felt rather low. Gameplay was ok. I really dig that your plans necessarily alter on a per move basis but in practice this turns an already lengthy game span well into 'is this over yet' territory. Not impressed.

Castle Panic was compelling enough for a friend to pick up as an introduction game with his younger brother and it is now on my short list to pick up in anticipation of my son adding a few years.

I liked Kingdom Builder enough to drop it on into 'eventually' status. Seems like it would be a good fast-paced introduction game.

Picked up a copy of A Few Acres of Snow for $30, a copy of Arkham Horror, and the 2 most recent Netrunner expansions.

I really, really like the Game of Thrones board game. The combat and herohouse card mechanics, the influence trees and consolidation of power, the assymetry of the different sides, the shifting alliances...this is a game I can get behind. Thus far I've only played two full games but we're going to add it to our normal rotation.

I want to, I really do, but a 3+ hour game with 4 people where someone can get either outright killed (or utterly shafted, and at best assist someone else to win) in the first hour really grinds my gears (when it happens to me ).

I know that this normally screws the player doing it to you as well, but it can happen even so.

I have found that eclipse hasn't done that so far, even my first game where I ended up boxed in (my own fault not anticipating the importance of the early exploration phase) still had much to interest me with optimising the creation of orbitals and monoliths while keeping sufficient fleet to be a deterrent but not perceived as a threat.

I liked Kingdom Builder enough to drop it on into 'eventually' status. Seems like it would be a good fast-paced introduction game.

I own it. Don't bother. It's not bad, but there are so many better games you can spend your time and money on.

My thoughts exactly. I like the game, but it falls in a weird place where it's a little tricky for non-gamers (particular the changing victory conditions), and a little too simplistic for my normal group. It's certainly not a bad game, but I don't recommend it.

I was in Madness in Plano on Saturday too, picking up Ticket to Ride Africa.

For a recent road trip (3 pre-teens and 1 teenager along) I bought two games: Mice and Mystics and Mage Wars.

Lesson learned: don't buy a new game and bring it on a trip. Nobody wants to spend vacation time trying to learn rules

That said, my 10-year-old reaaaalllly wanted to play Mage Wars so we got in an "apprentice" game. I think this game is a winner, it has the fun (IMO) of constructing a deck spellbook (without the money sink aspect) and then the strategy of gameplay that almost reminded me of an RTS...do I rush, do I build my "mana economy"...it has a bluffing aspect too. It's not so very complex either, my 6-year-old gets the rules even if his strategy may be a bit suspect

I considered Summoner Wars instead but the tyke wanted this one. And I must say, especially if expansions keep coming out, that I can see many replays with it.I'm really glad we have a head-to-head game to get Stratego off the table, bleah. I remember really liking it as a kid myself but I can't stand it now.

We haven't yet busted out Mice and Mystics and I'm hoping it's not one of those purchases I regret.

So far the most popular games with my kids have been two very similar games: WoW Adventure Game and Runebound. Of those two I prefer Runebound personally.